Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed by Congress on March 4, 1794, ratified by the states on February 7, 1795. The Eleventh Amendment restricts the ability of individuals to bring suit against states in federal court; the Eleventh Amendment was adopted to overrule the U. S. Supreme Court's decision in Georgia. In that case, the Supreme Court had held that states did not enjoy sovereign immunity from suits made by citizens of other states in federal court. Thus, the Eleventh Amendment established that federal courts do not have the authority to hear cases brought by private citizens against states. Nonetheless, the Supreme Court has held that Congress can abrogate state sovereign immunity when using its authority under the Bankruptcy Clause or Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment; the Supreme Court has held that federal courts can enjoin state officials from violating federal law. The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.
The Eleventh Amendment was the first Constitutional amendment adopted after the Bill of Rights. The amendment was adopted following the Supreme Court's ruling in Chisholm v. Georgia, 2 U. S. 419. In Chisholm, the Court ruled that federal courts had the authority to hear cases in law and equity brought by private citizens against states and that states did not enjoy sovereign immunity from suits made by citizens of other states in federal court. Thus, the amendment clarified Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution, which gives diversity jurisdiction to the judiciary to hear cases "between a state and citizens of another state"; the Eleventh Amendment was proposed by the 3rd Congress on March 4, 1794, when it was approved by the House of Representatives by vote of 81–9, having been passed by the Senate, 23–2, on January 14, 1794. The amendment was ratified by the state legislatures of the following states: New York – March 27, 1794 Rhode Island – March 31, 1794 Connecticut – May 8, 1794 New Hampshire – June 16, 1794 Massachusetts – June 26, 1794 Vermont – November 9, 1794 Virginia – November 18, 1794 Georgia – November 29, 1794 Kentucky – December 7, 1794 Maryland – December 26, 1794 Delaware – January 23, 1795 North Carolina – February 7, 1795As there were 15 States at the time, the ratification by twelve States added the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution.
It was subsequently ratified by: South Carolina – December 4, 1797On January 8, 1798 three years after the Eleventh Amendment's adoption, President John Adams stated in a message to Congress that the Eleventh Amendment had been ratified by the necessary number of States and that it was now a part of the Constitution of the United States. New Jersey and Pennsylvania did not take action on the amendment during that era. However, on June 25, 2018, the New Jersey Senate adopted Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 75 to symbolically post-ratify the Eleventh Amendment. In Hollingsworth v. Virginia, 3 U. S. 378, the Supreme Court held that every pending action brought under Chisholm had to be dismissed because of the amendment's adoption. The amendment's text does not mention suits brought against a state by its own citizens. However, in Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U. S. 1, the Supreme Court ruled. As Justice Anthony Kennedy stated in Alden v. Maine, 527 U. S. 706: overeign immunity derives not from the Eleventh Amendment but from the structure of the original Constitution itself....
Nor can we conclude that the specific Article I powers delegated to Congress include, by virtue of the Necessary and Proper Clause or otherwise, the incidental authority to subject the States to private suits as a means of achieving objectives otherwise within the scope of the enumerated powers. However, Justice David Souter, writing for a four-Justice dissent in Alden, said the states surrendered their sovereign immunity when they ratified the Constitution, he read the amendment's text as reflecting a narrow form of sovereign immunity that limited only the diversity jurisdiction of the federal courts. He concluded that neither the Eleventh Amendment in particular nor the Constitution in general insulates the states from suits by individuals. Eleventh Amendment immunity protects states from lawsuits by foreign states in federal courts. Although the Eleventh Amendment grants immunity to states from suit for money damages or equitable relief without their consent, in Ex parte Young, 209 U. S. 123, the Supreme Court ruled that federal courts may enjoin state officials from violating federal law.
In Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, 427 U. S. 445, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress may abrogate state immunity from suit under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In Central Virginia Community College v. Katz, 546 U. S. 356, the Court ruled the Congress could do the same regarding bankruptcy cases by way of Article I, Section 8, Clause 4 of the Constitution. In Lapides v. Board of Regents of Univ. System of Ga. 535 U. S. 613, the Supreme Court ruled that when a state invokes a federal court's removal jurisdiction, it waives the Eleventh Amendment in the removed case. The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has ruled that Puerto Rico enjoys Eleventh Amendment immunity; the territories of American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands do not enjoy Eleventh Amendment immunity. Atascadero State Hospital v. Scanlon Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Education Expense Board v. College Savings Bank
Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution addresses criminal procedure and other aspects of the Constitution. It was ratified in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights; the Fifth Amendment applies to every level of the government, including the federal and local levels, as well as any corporation, private enterprise, group, or individual, or any foreign government in regards to a US citizen or resident of the US. The Supreme Court furthered the protections of this amendment through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. One provision of the Fifth Amendment requires that felonies be tried only upon indictment by a grand jury. Another provision, the Double Jeopardy Clause, provides the right of defendants to be tried only once in federal court for the same offense; the self-incrimination clause provides various protections against self-incrimination, including the right of an individual to not serve as a witness in a criminal case in which they are the defendant. "Pleading the Fifth" is a colloquial term used to invoke the self-incrimination clause when witnesses decline to answer questions where the answers might incriminate them.
In the 1966 case of Miranda v. Arizona, the Supreme Court held that the self-incrimination clause requires the police to issue a Miranda warning to criminal suspects interrogated while under police custody; the Fifth Amendment contains the Takings Clause, which allows the federal government to take private property for public use if the government provides "just compensation." Like the Fourteenth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment includes a due process clause stating that no person shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." The Fifth Amendment's due process clause applies to the federal government, while the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause applies to state governments. The Supreme Court has interpreted the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause as providing two main protections: procedural due process, which requires government officials to follow fair procedures before depriving a person of life, liberty, or property, substantive due process, which protects certain fundamental rights from government interference.
The Supreme Court has held that the Due Process Clause contains a prohibition against vague laws and an implied equal protection requirement similar to the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. The amendment as proposed by Congress in 1789 reads as follows: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger. On June 8, 1789, Congressman James Madison introduced several proposed constitutional amendments during a speech to the House of Representatives, his draft language that became the Fifth Amendment was as follows:No person shall be subject, except in cases of impeachment, to more than one punishment or trial for the same offense. This draft was edited by Congress. After approval by Congress, the amendment was ratified by the states on December 15, 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights.
Every one of the five clauses in the final amendment appeared in Madison's draft, in their final order those clauses are the Grand Jury Clause, the Double Jeopardy Clause, the Self Incrimination Clause, the Due Process Clause, the Takings Clause. The grand jury is a pre-constitutional common law institution, a constitutional fixture in its own right embracing common law; the process applies to the states to the extent that the states have incorporated grand juries and/or common law. Most states have an alternative civil process. "Although state systems of criminal procedure differ among themselves, the grand jury is guaranteed by many state constitutions and plays an important role in fair and effective law enforcement in the overwhelming majority of the States." Branzburg v. Hayes 1972. Grand juries, which return indictments in many criminal cases, are composed of a jury of peers and operate in closed deliberation proceedings. Many constitutional restrictions that apply in court or in other situations do not apply during grand jury proceedings.
For example, the exclusionary rule does not apply to certain evidence presented to a grand jury. An individual does not have the right to have an attorney present in the grand jury room during hearings. An individual would have such a right during questioning by the police while in custody, but an individual testifying before a grand jury is free to le
United States Army
The United States Army is the land warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the seven uniformed services of the United States, is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution; as the oldest and most senior branch of the U. S. military in order of precedence, the modern U. S. Army has its roots in the Continental Army, formed to fight the American Revolutionary War —before the United States of America was established as a country. After the Revolutionary War, the Congress of the Confederation created the United States Army on 3 June 1784 to replace the disbanded Continental Army; the United States Army considers itself descended from the Continental Army, dates its institutional inception from the origin of that armed force in 1775. As a uniformed military service, the U. S. Army is part of the Department of the Army, one of the three military departments of the Department of Defense; the U. S. Army is headed by a civilian senior appointed civil servant, the Secretary of the Army and by a chief military officer, the Chief of Staff of the Army, a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
It is the largest military branch, in the fiscal year 2017, the projected end strength for the Regular Army was 476,000 soldiers. S. Army was 1,018,000 soldiers; as a branch of the armed forces, the mission of the U. S. Army is "to fight and win our Nation's wars, by providing prompt, land dominance, across the full range of military operations and the spectrum of conflict, in support of combatant commanders"; the branch participates in conflicts worldwide and is the major ground-based offensive and defensive force of the United States. The United States Army serves as the land-based branch of the U. S. Armed Forces. Section 3062 of Title 10, U. S. Code defines the purpose of the army as: Preserving the peace and security and providing for the defense of the United States, the Commonwealths and possessions and any areas occupied by the United States Supporting the national policies Implementing the national objectives Overcoming any nations responsible for aggressive acts that imperil the peace and security of the United StatesIn 2018, the Army Strategy 2018 articulated an eight-point addendum to the Army Vision for 2028.
While the Army Mission remains constant, the Army Strategy builds upon the Army's Brigade Modernization by adding focus to Corps and Division-level echelons. Modernization, reform for high-intensity conflict, Joint multi-domain operations are added to the strategy, to be completed by 2028; the Continental Army was created on 14 June 1775 by the Second Continental Congress as a unified army for the colonies to fight Great Britain, with George Washington appointed as its commander. The army was led by men who had served in the British Army or colonial militias and who brought much of British military heritage with them; as the Revolutionary War progressed, French aid and military thinking helped shape the new army. A number of European soldiers came on their own to help, such as Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, who taught Prussian Army tactics and organizational skills; the army fought numerous pitched battles and in the South in 1780–1781, at times using the Fabian strategy and hit-and-run tactics, under the leadership of Major General Nathanael Greene, hit where the British were weakest to wear down their forces.
Washington led victories against the British at Trenton and Princeton, but lost a series of battles in the New York and New Jersey campaign in 1776 and the Philadelphia campaign in 1777. With a decisive victory at Yorktown and the help of the French, the Continental Army prevailed against the British. After the war, the Continental Army was given land certificates and disbanded in a reflection of the republican distrust of standing armies. State militias became the new nation's sole ground army, with the exception of a regiment to guard the Western Frontier and one battery of artillery guarding West Point's arsenal. However, because of continuing conflict with Native Americans, it was soon realized that it was necessary to field a trained standing army; the Regular Army was at first small and after General St. Clair's defeat at the Battle of the Wabash, the Regular Army was reorganized as the Legion of the United States, established in 1791 and renamed the United States Army in 1796; the War of 1812, the second and last war between the United States and Great Britain, had mixed results.
The U. S. Army did not conquer Canada but it did destroy Native American resistance to expansion in the Old Northwest and it validated its independence by stopping two major British invasions in 1814 and 1815. After taking control of Lake Erie in 1813, the U. S. Army seized parts of western Upper Canada, burned York and defeated Tecumseh, which caused his Western Confederacy to collapse. Following U. S. victories in the Canadian province of Upper Canada, British troops who had dubbed the U. S. Army "Regulars, by God!", were able to capture and burn Washington, defended by militia, in 1814. The regular army, however proved they were professional and capable of defeating the British army during the invasions of Plattsburgh and Baltimore, prompting British agreement on the rejected terms of a status quo ante bellum. Two weeks after a treaty was signed, Andrew Jackson defeated the British in the Battle of New Orleans and Siege of Fort St. Philip, became a national hero. U. S. troops and sailors captured HMS Cyane and Penguin in the final engagements of the war.
Per the treaty, both sides (the United S
Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution repealed the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which had mandated nationwide Prohibition on alcohol. The Twenty-first Amendment was proposed by Congress on February 20, 1933, was ratified by the requisite number of states on December 5, 1933, it is unique among the 27 amendments of the U. S. Constitution for being the only one to repeal a prior amendment, as well as being the only amendment to have been ratified by state ratifying conventions; the Eighteenth Amendment was ratified on January 16, 1919, the result of years of advocacy by the temperance movement. The subsequent passage of the Volstead Act established federal enforcement of the nationwide prohibition on alcohol; as many Americans continued to drink despite the amendment, Prohibition gave rise to a profitable black market for alcohol, fueling the rise of organized crime. Throughout the 1920's, Americans came to see Prohibition as unenforceable, a movement to repeal the Eighteenth Amendment grew until the Twenty-first Amendment was ratified in 1933.
Section 1 of the Twenty-first Amendment expressly repeals the Eighteenth Amendment. Section 2 bans the importation of alcohol into states and territories that have laws prohibiting the importation or consumption of alcohol. Several states continued to be "dry states" in the years after the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment, but in 1966 the last dry state legalized the consumption of alcohol. Nonetheless, several states continue to regulate the distribution of alcohol. Many states delegate their power to ban the importation of alcohol to counties and municipalities, there are numerous dry communities throughout the United States. Section 2 has arisen as in issue in Supreme Court cases that touch on the Commerce Clause. Section 1; the eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed. Section 2; the transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.
Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress; the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution had ushered in a period known as Prohibition, during which the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages was illegal. Passage of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919 was the crowning achievement of the temperance movement, but it soon proved unpopular. Crime rates soared under Prohibition as gangsters, such as Chicago's Al Capone, became rich from a profitable violent black market for alcohol; the federal government was incapable of stemming the tide: enforcement of the Volstead Act proved to be a nearly impossible task and corruption was rife among law enforcement agencies. In 1932, wealthy industrialist John D. Rockefeller, Jr. stated in a letter:When Prohibition was introduced, I hoped that it would be supported by public opinion and the day would soon come when the evil effects of alcohol would be recognized.
I have and reluctantly come to believe that this has not been the result. Instead, drinking has increased; as more and more Americans opposed the Eighteenth Amendment, a political movement grew for its repeal. However, repeal was complicated by grassroots politics. Although the U. S. Constitution provides two methods for ratifying constitutional amendments, only one method had been used up until that time. However, the wisdom of the day was that the lawmakers of many states were either beholden to or fearful of the temperance lobby; the Congress adopted the Blaine Act and proposed the Twenty-first Amendment on February 20, 1933. The proposed amendment was adopted on December 5, 1933, it is the only amendment to have been ratified by state ratifying conventions, specially selected for the purpose. All other amendments have been ratified by state legislatures, it is the only amendment, approved for the explicit purpose of repealing a existing amendment to the Constitution. The Twenty-first Amendment ending national prohibition became effective on December 15, though people started drinking before that date.
The various responses of the 48 states is as follows:The following states ratified the amendment: Ratification was completed on December 5, 1933. The amendment was subsequently ratified by conventions in the following states: The amendment was rejected by the following state: South Carolina Voters in the following state rejected holding a convention to consider the amendment: North Carolina The following states took no action to consider the amendment: Georgia Kansas Louisiana Mississippi Nebraska North Dakota Oklahoma South Dakota The second section bans the importation of alcohol in violation of state or territorial law; this has been interpreted to give states absolute control over alcoholic beverages, many U. S. states still remained "dry" long after its ratification. Mississippi was the last, remaining dry until 1966. Many states now delegate the authority over alcohol granted to them by this Amendment to their municipaliti
Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. It prohibits unreasonable seizures. In addition, it sets requirements for issuing warrants: warrants must be issued by a judge or magistrate, justified by probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, must describe the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized. Fourth Amendment case law deals with three main issues: what government activities are "searches" and "seizures," what constitutes probable cause to conduct searches and seizures, how violations of Fourth Amendment rights should be addressed. Early court decisions limited the amendment's scope to physical intrusion of property or persons, but with Katz v. United States, the Supreme Court held that its protections extend to intrusions on the privacy of individuals as well as to physical locations. A warrant is needed for most search and seizure activities, but the Court has carved out a series of exceptions for consent searches, motor vehicle searches, evidence in plain view, exigent circumstances, border searches, other situations.
The exclusionary rule is one way. Established in Weeks v. United States, this rule holds that evidence obtained as a result of a Fourth Amendment violation is inadmissible at criminal trials. Evidence discovered as a result of an illegal search may be inadmissible as "fruit of the poisonous tree", unless it would have been discovered by legal means; the Fourth Amendment was adopted in response to the abuse of the writ of assistance, a type of general search warrant issued by the British government, a major source of tension in pre-Revolutionary America. The Fourth Amendment was introduced in Congress in 1789 by James Madison, along with the other amendments in the Bill of Rights, in response to Anti-Federalist objections to the new Constitution. Congress submitted the amendment to the states on September 28, 1789. By December 15, 1791, the necessary three-fourths of the states had ratified it. On March 1, 1792, Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson announced that it was part of the Constitution.
Because the Bill of Rights did not apply to state or local governments, federal criminal investigations were less common in the first century of the nation's history, there is little significant case law for the Fourth Amendment before the 20th century. The amendment was held to apply to state and local governments in Mapp v. Ohio via the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, describing the place to be searched, the persons or things to be seized. Like many other areas of American law, the Fourth Amendment finds its roots in English legal doctrine. In Semayne's case, Sir Edward Coke famously stated: "The house of every one is to him as his castle and fortress, as well for his defence against injury and violence as for his repose." Semayne's Case acknowledged that the King did not have unbridled authority to intrude on his subjects' dwellings, but recognized that government agents were permitted to conduct searches and seizures under certain conditions when their purpose was lawful and a warrant had been obtained.
The 1760s saw a growth in the intensity of litigation against state officers, using general warrants, conducted raids in search of materials relating to John Wilkes's publications attacking both government policies and the King himself. The most famous of these cases involved John Entick, whose home was forcibly entered by the King's Messenger Nathan Carrington, along with others, pursuant to a warrant issued by George Montagu-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax authorizing them "to make strict and diligent search for... the author, or one concerned in the writing of several weekly seditious papers entitled,'The Monitor or British Freeholder, No 257, 357, 358, 360, 373, 376, 378, 380,'" and seized printed charts and other materials. Entick filed suit in Entick v Carrington, argued before the Court of King's Bench in 1765. Charles Pratt, 1st Earl Camden ruled that both the search and the seizure were unlawful, as the warrant authorized the seizure of all of Entick's papers—not just the criminal ones—and as the warrant lacked probable cause to justify the search.
By holding that "ur law holds the property of every man so sacred, that no man can set his foot upon his neighbour's close without his leave", Entick established the English precedent that the executive is limited in intruding on private property by common law. Homes in Colonial America, on the other hand, did not enjoy the same sanctity as their British counterparts, because legislation had been explicitly written so as to enable enforcement of British revenue-gathering policies on customs. During what scholar William Cuddihy called the "colonial epidemic of general searches", the authorities possessed unlimited power to search for anything at any time, with little oversight. In 1756, the colony of Massachusetts barred the use of general warrants; this represented the first law in American history curtailing the use of seizure power. Its creation stemmed from the great public outcry over the Excise Act of 1754, which gave tax collectors unlimited powers to interrogate colonists concerning their use of goods subject to customs.
The act permitted the use of a general warrant known as a writ of assistance, allowing tax collectors to search the hom
Twentieth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Twentieth Amendment to the United States Constitution moved the beginning and ending of the terms of the president and vice president from March 4 to January 20, of members of Congress from March 4 to January 3. It has provisions that determine what is to be done when there is no president-elect; the Twentieth Amendment was adopted on January 23, 1933. The amendment was designed to limit the "lame duck" period, the period served by Congress and the president after an election but before the end of the terms of those who were not re-elected. Indirectly, the amendment requires the incoming Congress, rather than the outgoing Congress, to hold a contingent election in the event that no individual wins a majority of the electoral vote in a presidential election; the amendment establishes procedures in the case that a president-elect dies, is not chosen, or otherwise fails to qualify prior to the start of a new presidential term. Section 1; the terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified.
Section 2. The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day. Section 3. If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President elect shall have died, the Vice President elect shall become President. If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified. Section 4; the Congress may by law provide for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the House of Representatives may choose a President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them, for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the Senate may choose a Vice President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them. Section 5. Sections 1 and 2 shall take effect on the 15th day of October following the ratification of this article.
Section 6. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission. Article I, Section 4, Clause 2 of the Constitution states that Congress must meet at least once per year, on the first Monday in December, though Congress could by law set another date and the president could summon special sessions; the original text of the Constitution set a duration for the terms of federal elected officials, but not the specific dates on which those terms would begin or end. In September 1788, after the necessary nine states had ratified the Constitution, the Congress of the Confederation set March 4, 1789, as the date "for commencing proceedings" of the newly reorganized government. Despite the fact that the new Congress and presidential administration did not begin operation until April, March 4 was deemed to be the beginning of the newly elected officials' terms of office, thus of the terms of their successors.
The Constitution did not specify a date for federal elections, but by the time of the second presidential election in 1792, Congress had passed a law requiring presidential electors to be chosen during November or early December. By 1845, this was narrowed in early November. Congressional elections were held on the same day; the result of these scheduling decisions was that there was a long, four-month lame duck period between the election and inauguration of the president. For Congress, the situation was even more awkward; because Article I, Section 4, Clause 2 mandated a Congressional meeting every December, after the election but before Congressional terms of office had expired, a lame duck session was required by the Constitution in even-numbered years. Special sessions sometimes met earlier in the year, but this never became a regular practice, despite the Constitution allowing for it. In practice, Congress met in a long session beginning in Decembers of odd-numbered years, in a short lame duck session in December of even-numbered years.
The long lame duck period might have been a practical necessity at the end of the 18th century, when any newly elected official might require several months to put his affairs in order and undertake an arduous journey from his home to the national capital, but it had the effect of impeding the functioning of government in the modern age. From the early 19th century onward, it meant that a lame duck Congress and presidential administration would fail to adequately respond to a significant national crisis in a timely manner; each institution could do this on the theory that at best, a lame duck Congress or administration had neither the time nor the mandate to tackle problems, whereas the incoming administration or Congress would have both the time, a fresh electoral mandate, to examine and address the problems that the nation faced. These problems likely would have been at the cente
Article Seven of the United States Constitution
Article Seven of the United States Constitution sets the number of state ratifications necessary in order for the Constitution to take effect and prescribes the method through which the states may ratify it. Under the terms of Article VII, constitutional ratification conventions were held in each of the thirteen states, with the ratification of nine states required for the Constitution to take effect. Delaware was the first state to ratify the Constitution, doing so on December 7, 1787. On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the Constitution, ensuring that the Constitution would take effect. Rhode Island was the last state to ratify the Constitution under Article VII, doing so on May 29, 1790; the Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same. On September 20, 1787, three days after its adoption by the Constitutional Convention, the drafted Constitution was submitted to the Congress of the Confederation for its endorsement.
After eight days of debate, the opposing sides came to the first of many compromises that would define the ratification process. The Confederation Congress voted to release the proposed Constitution to the states for their consideration, but neither endorsed nor opposed its ratification; the Constitution was ratified by the 13 states between December 7, 1787 and May 29, 1790 as follows: In 1787 and 1788, following the Constitutional Convention, a great debate took place throughout the United States over the Constitution, proposed. The supporters of the Constitution began the ratification campaign in those states where there was little or no controversy, postponing until the more difficult ones. On July 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the Constitution, thus establishing it as the new framework of governance for the United States. Though enacted, four states, New York, North Carolina and Rhode Island remained outside the new government; the Congress of the Confederation chose March 4, 1789 as the day "for commencing proceedings under the Constitution."
Virginia and New York ratified the Constitution before the members of the new Congress assembled on the appointed day to bring the new government into operation. After twelve amendments, including the ten in the Bill of Rights, were sent to the states in June 1789, North Carolina ratified the Constitution. Rhode Island, after having rejected the Constitution in a March 1788 referendum, called a ratifying convention in 1790. Faced with the threat of being treated as a foreign government, it ratified the Constitution by the narrowest margin. Secessionists have used Article VII to argue that states have a right to secede from the Union by revoking their ratification of the Constitution. Virginia's ratification of the Constitution declared that, "the powers granted under the Constitution being derived from the People of the United States may be resumed by them whensoever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression." New York and Rhode Island's ratifications declared that, "That the powers of government may be reassumed by the people, whensoever it shall become necessary to their happiness."
The New York Convention contemplated going a step farther, adding language to the effect that "there should be reserved to the state of New York a right to withdraw herself from the union after a certain number of years." The Madison federalists opposed this, with Hamilton, a delegate to the convention, reading aloud in response a letter from James Madison stating: "the Constitution requires an adoption in toto, for ever". Hamilton and John Jay told the convention that in their view, reserving "a right to withdraw inconsistent with the Constitution, was no ratification"; the New York convention ratified the Constitution without including the "right to withdraw" language proposed by the anti-federalists. At the start of the Civil War, four of the original thirteen states seceded from the Union, South Carolina, Georgia and North Carolina. In their ordinances of secession they declared that their newly elected conventions were repealing the acts of the previous conventions ratifying the Constitution.
Abraham Lincoln maintained that secession was unconstitutional, these States along with the other Confederate States were defeated. Timeline of drafting and ratification of the United States Constitution The Federalist Papers Anti-Federalist Papers Gary Lawson & Guy Seidman, When Did the Constitution become Law, 77Notre Dame L. Rev.1 Steve Mount, The Federalists and Anti-Federalists, usconstitution.net
